Fill-In refs hooked us with their chaos

Upon further review, we've decided that we're going to miss the NFL's replacement referees.

ESPN first reported Wednesday that the league and referee's union are close to settling their labor dispute and that there already have been discussions about the real referees returning this weekend.

The notion seemed to pick up steam as the day went on, with Colts owner Jim Irsay tweeting "Your loud voices r heard about getting refs back. We're desperately trying 2 get it done!"

Where was that desperation before the Monday Night Farce that prompted more than 70,000 loud voices to jam the NFL's voicemail?

We are hoping to see Ed Hochuli break out his bodybuilder guns in new Nike-designed referee uniforms as early as Thursday night when the Ravens and Browns square off on the NFL Network.

The Associated Press reported late Wednesday that the league and referees' union reached a tentative contract agreement.

But we have to say, we're sorry to see the fill-in refs go on one level.

Every week we had a feeling that something could go terribly wrong, and that we were watching a fiasco. It did, and we were. The replacements turned the NFL into the Lindsay Lohan of professional leagues.

We had to watch or risk missing their next clueless adventure:

An extra timeout for the Seahawks against the Cardinals.

A penalty marched off from the Detroit 44 instead of the Tennessee 44 leading to a Titans game-winning field goal in overtime.

Confusion over which calls can and cannot be reviewed.

Escalating aggressiveness from players willing to test and intimidate the substitutes.

We complained that games were tainted, but we still watched them. According to Darren Rovell, ESPN's sports business expert, NFL broadcasts topped the ratings in all 30 league markets for the first three weeks of the season for the first time.

And after we watched, we wanted to talk about it. When Seattle was declared the winner Monday night, our Cardinals guy Kent Somers pointed out that Twitter lit up like he hadn't seen since those Navy Seals caught up to Osama bin Laden.

The tweeters might have been nicer to bin Laden.

Anyway, the finish in Seattle was a moment made for social media, and some NFL players might be a little lighter in the wallet after the dust settles because they jumped into the discussion and pulled no f-bombs.

(We asked NFL spokesman Greg Aiello via Twitter about the league's stance on ref-bashing on Twitter and other media, but he did not respond.)

Whether it's tonight, this weekend or soon thereafter, the real officials will return and they will botch some calls. We'll cheer their return, then boo their mistakes. And maybe we'll appreciate them a little more.

It's possible that a real crew might have muffed that call in the end zone on "Monday Night Football," too.

However, a real crew probably wouldn't have missed several other penalties, including a block in the back and an offensive pass interference on the same final play, that literally left the game up for grabs.

Two members of a real crew looking at the play probably wouldn't have looked at each other, hesitated and thrust their hands in the air -- one indicating a touchdown a fraction of a second before the other signaled to stop the clock.

Instead, two real officials would have -- as the replacements should have -- huddled and discussed what they saw before signaling anything.

If they still ruled it was a touchdown, we'd like to think a real referee would have gone under the hood, known what simultaneous possession is and what it looks like, then ruled there was an interception on the play and not a touchdown reception.

There would be no confusion about who was making the decision. There seems to be the idea out there that the replay official and supervisor in the booth "upheld" the call.

It was referee Wayne Elliott's responsibility to decide whether there was irrefutable visual evidence to overturn the call on the field. That's the NFL system.

The replay official and supervisor might have been in agreement with him or not. We might never know.

Notice that the NFL's statement said, "The NFL Officiating Department reviewed the video . . . and supports the decision not to overturn the on-field ruling following the instant replay review."

That's not saying that the call was correct.

It's saying that they support Elliott in his decision not to overturn it based on the visual evidence that he saw.

If nothing else, the call brought this saga to a head and might have made NFL owners realize just how difficult it is to replace their officials and how unfair it was to their fans to even try.

We can thank the replacements for that much, at least.

Reach Young at 602-444-8271 or bob.young@arizonarepublic.com. Follow him at Twitter/BobYoungTHI.